The Wandering Inn

The Wandering Inn, Book 1

By: pirateaba

Narrated by: Andrea Parsneau

Length: 43 hrs and 10 mins

Publisher's Summary

An inn is a place to rest, a place to talk and share stories, a place to find adventure, or a starting ground for quests and legends. 

It is in this world, at least. To Erin Solstice, an inn seems like a medieval relic from the past. But here she is, running from Goblins and trying to survive in a world full of monsters and magic. She’d be more excited about all of this if everything wasn’t trying to kill her. But an inn is what she’s found, and so that’s what she becomes; an innkeeper, who serves drinks to heroes and monsters.

Actually, mostly monsters. But it’s a living, right? 

©2018 pirateaba (P)2019 Podium Publishing

Just... terrible

Do you want to hear an exciting adventure about a woman transported to a fantasy world and having to adapt and overcome monsters and dangerous environments, all while running an inn?

Too bad. You get to hear a girl whining about being stuck there. Whining about the people that help her. Whining about the situations she gets herself into either by dumb decisions or by just being dumb. She supposedly runs an inn but she literally complains about the effort of having to move her pillows and blankets to the second floor of the inn and just sleeps in the kitchen.

Then you get roped into thinking a new, better protagonist is emerging. A strong, silent protagonist but surely better than a whiney "innkeeper", yes? Nope, instead of whining this one just lashes out. She hates everyone and everything for no good reason. She gets into a fight with one woman just because she is pretty.

It's like the characters know they are in a horrible book and are trying to scare the reader off.

But of course all the secondary characters love them and go out of there way to help them. Other than feeding them food, there is no likable quality to the innkeeper and the other main character is just an arrogant prat. No one would go out of their way for these people.

You do get to hear so man-hating and prejiduce for no apparant reason though. For two main characters that constantly judge people and comment on everyones appearance, they sure do get judgey and preachy on one anyone that does the same.

Oh, and chess. You get to hear a lot about chess. Don't care about chess? Too bad, here is some more freaking chess.

I choose to read litrpg because I want to immerse myself in the world and people but you are constantly yanked out of the fantasy by hearing the main characters complain about how terrible it is.

Do yourself a favor and find another way to spend 40 hours.

I should have heeded the other negative reviews

I have never been so thankful for a book to be finished. Like so many other readers, for the first three quarters of the book, I kept wishing the main character would be put out of my misery. Why did everyone keep saving her? I never could understand the reason.
There were moments I got interested in the plot and that kept me listening. However, I truly do not know how the book ended despite having "listened" to the last chapters 3 times. My mind wandered every single time. I have never experienced that before. I can only say that after struggling through my dislike of characters and confusion caused by decisions and overreactions, I finally lost all interest in their fates.

Repetitive, Exhausting.... Quit at Ch17

Good grief. The main character is such a moron.... cant even make fire??? gets to a new world and first thing she does is clean an old inn?? Feels bad about the death of Goblins? I just cannot suspend my belief enough to stop rolling my eyes. Mid-way through Ch 17 I quit. Im 17 chapters in and still have no idea what the actual plot might be. Like... WHAT IS THE STORY??? Who knows. Can't stick with it to find out.

Only bought because of size and looked ok. Boy was I wrong

Wow, so after the long title I’m not sure what else to say. I got this just because of the size and it looked ok. I am so glad I did. This book rocks.

It is an excellent listen. This is one of the few five star books I have ever really heard. A true 5 star is the best of the best. And the story here is.

Endless whining and painfully slow

I managed to listen 7h of this book, hoping for it to grip me but no. Main lead keeps whining like entitled teen and cannot do anything at all without long monologues how unfair everything is. I see all the reviews saying that it gets good but 7 hours and listening feels like homework that you are forced to slog through so i simply cannot continue anymore.

Beyond brilliant, so glad I decided on this one!

Never thought I'd make a review on an E-book, but I just HAVE to give back a little of what this book has given to me, it feels like the price I paid for it was not enough.

I can see that the majority of bad reviews bash the main character, and while the story is still GREAT early on, I can see why they might dislike Erin for the very first few chapters.

But this story just picks up and quickly turns from great to amazing, Erin too, I use E-books as listening material while I draw, and this book made me impatient to get to my daily drawing just so I can keep listening to it,
The world is alive and filled with loveable characters and concepts, parts to make you laugh, parts to make you cry, parts to make you genuinely horrified, an incredible world you quickly become a part of!

The narrator is everything a narrator could and should be, she portrays the voices of different characters so well that you can completely forget you're listening to an e-book narrator rather than a conversation between two characters - until more Volumes come out I might just have to pick my next E-book according to what else she narrated.

If I have any complaints it all, it would just be that there's only one Volume on Audible at the date of this review, which is torture, as I can see it was only rather recently released, but if all Volumes were available as E-books, there's not a single doubt in my mind I would listen to all of them in succession!

amazing writing but....

the two characters continuously have emotional breakdowns but no real breakthrough. they appear to have emotional breakthroughs and then they do the exact same thing over and over again I don't understand the writing style from that standpoint. the writer makes you think that they're going to overcome creates a amazing moment and then they don't and this continues to happen throughout the whole book, these are two amazingly strong women that the author continues to make them look weak and vulnerable all the time with random outbursts of anger.

needs an editor

"hesitated" you will hear that word almost every sentence. The author has a bad habit of over explaining and getting repetitive. story is great, characters are good. worth listening to.

interesting take on isekai adventure books

It seems like ever since SAO came out, isekai style books, Manga, and anime have been everywhere. Don't get me wrong, I love a "transported to another world" genre, but it starts to get stale after a while.

Not this book though. This follows a girl who is, in all presented aspects, normal. She's not an OP SUPER GOD like the usual isekai fair. She's a lost girl who found an inn, and whoops, she's now an innkeeper in a world of animal-people and magic. I won't go into more detail because I want you to follow her story yourself, it's worth the trip. The characters have depth, emotion, growth, the world is well structured and makes sense, and the progression of the story is never halting, nor does it drag on.
Oh, and there's chess. I'm a sucker for chess. Pirate Aba, if you ever read this and want to play, give me a holler, cus it sounds like you'd be a fun opponent.

I was itching to listen to more and more of this book, and when it ended (about 1 minute ago from the time of writing this) I was actually pretty upset it was over. 43 hours over the course of about a week, and I want more, more, MORE. In fact, as soon as this review is done, I'm off to start reading Volume 2, so I'm now in a hurry.

Andrea Parsenau is, as usual, a wonderful narrator. She is among the small list of people who's narrations I will listen to, even if the book they're narrating seems strange, simply because their work is that good.

Give this book a listen, even if you're tired of isekai adventures. I promise you won't regret it.

cant stand the main characters

Great Narration , that I about it, the basis of the story is childish, the 2 main characters are horrid people, rude ungrateful Brats, one thinks she is better than everyone and everything, the other, shes a hot mess and all over the place, I can't say it's a good thing when you keep hoping the main ones in the story will hurry up and get eaten. I made it to chapter 43, can't even make it to see if the minator kicks her butt, although it would be the best part of the book, maybe she would end up as a humble pie class

Worth the wait

I've been waiting for this to come out for ages!

I love the complexity of the world Pirateaba creates, and the emotions they invoke. Oh dear god, no other author can make me cry over the fate of goblins like they can. It's amazingly long (just what I like) with clear character development. The video game aspect is a tiny fraction of the story, so if like me, you hate reading/listening to endless number crunching of stats and point allocation, there's absolutely nothing to worry about here. Better yet, this is one story where the mechanics of the level-up system are questioned and are actually plot relevant. The real focus here is plot plot plot. The detail is astounding and no plot thread is ever forgotten, it may not come up for hours, but it does circle back around. I can't compliment the world-building enough.

My one niggle is that I don't like Erin's voice. It just doesn't fit the character I have in my mind. Can't complain about the narration otherwise.

great book

Ignore the people who say the main character is whiney, especially as she's know for being up beat through the book and it's a more realistic take on how someone would behave in her situation and it really picks up towards the end!
Diverse range of species, some you'll recognise and some you won't and some awkward stereotype mishaps with the main character.
a real easy listen especially as it's 40+ hours.

Gutted !!

I'm absolutely gutted this brilliant story has come to an end. Why? Please please please hurry up and do volume two on audiobook. I am at a loss now what to do with my self!! What will happen to Erin? Will she meet Ryoka???
What an amazing story. Pirate you are a genius. Mesmerising from start to end.

Pretty awfull

First of all not a litrpg at all. Going to sleep and inserting random skills and numbers barely related to what the mc did Is just lazy and bad writing.

The inconsistency in the mc is bad like plain "bee sting" infuriating. How someone this stupid survived is beyond me she should be shot and put out of her misery. In fact it's pretty good fundamental understanding of a less "mentally capable" person if that was the authors intention... obviously it's not.

you first meet new characters like 5 hours in and nothing really happens untill then except for the mc demonstrating that survival of the fittest does not apply in this story or mc would be dead faster than you can say "bad writing".

it might be cruel to real mentally disable people to put some one like mc in the same category as them but no word or categorisation currently existed that can describe the mind boggling infuriating stupidity that main character displays therefore accept my apology.

I dont know what else to say really. no other redeeming qualities I wouldn't continue listening to this authors work if you paid me. So bad it's funny, except not funny at all. wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole. A child with a crayon has concocted better story's. This is why we cant have nice things. If I was Amazon I would ban the author of this drivel for life from all amazon services also his family, friends anyone who's ever spoken to him.

if you have read the review one thing should be clear I really hate this book it's so bad it made me dislike the author as a person.

DO NOT BUY

Interesting premise

I enjoyed the world building but the narrator's voice grated, it was tough to get through, and the main character is useless. Just whiney and irritating. I really wanted to like this novel as I enjoyed the interesting concepts it explores.

not what i had expected

This might be just me but after listening to 16 chapters have had to give up . The narrator is ok but the voice she adopts for the main character is just too irritating for me , yes she is meant to be early 20 s but sounds very young whinning . maybe the story develops later but havnt the stamina to get there. perhaps its best if people make their own mind up , can only give my preferences not often I give up on a book .

Western Isekai at its best #NotLitRPG

In my opinion this is not a book for everyone. Neither it is a LitRPG book.
Instead what you get is a Western bite at so currently popular Isekai trope light novels. And like all good light novels this one too starts with a web novel.
It has everything required in the droves. Transported into another world. Check. Game-like elements like skills and levels. Check. All sorts of weird humanoid races. Check. Grand story in the background while the MC deals with her everyday life in new world (aka slice of life). Check.
Indeed the only thing that hints this is a Western novel and not Japanese Isekai is that kobolds aren't noble samurai dogs.
And don't let me started with the excellent narration of Andrea. It made the world of Wandering Inn so much livelier with her wide range of voices and characters.

It's a must have for any Isekai lover, though I'd recommend it to anyone who likes fantasy, as this book is an excellent gateway into the fantastic universe of otherworldly adventures.

So FRUSTRATED!

So after 28 hours of listening...

I have never been so frustrated by an audiobook.

It has such good potential. but nothing ever really happens and it's got crazy slow pacing.

Both main characters are rude, slow witted, void of creativity or adaptability & stubborn beyond belief.

Also, Erin is completely useless....

Good story but lots of issues

It is a good story however the two main characters are incredibly annoying, particularly in the first half of the book. Whinging and pretty thick. There are also several errors in the plot and the story probably could have been told in about half of the time. I guess it’s good value for one credit and overall it was enjoyable despite having shouted out loud at the annoying characters several times!

Excellent when is the next out. Highly addicted

Excellent I'm hooked can't wait for the next. Fabulous narrative highly recommended. Didn't think I'd like it but really good.